Paid for by TEP for Tucson

The City of Tucson doesn’t play around when it comes to putting an argument in its publicity pamphlet.

You have to pay your share — $240 — to get your arguments into the pamphlet that’s sent to every mailbox in the Old Pueblo.

TEP for Tucson, a political action committee wholly funded by Tucson Electric Power, spent roughly $14,000 to pay for 59 arguments in favor of its Proposition 421 on the ballot in November. The PAC offered to reimburse anyone who wanted to file an argument in favor of the franchise renewal agreement.

Almost half of the arguments with the “Paid for by TEP for Tucson” disclaimer came from TEP employees arguing for the 25-year franchise renewal.

Community members who took TEP up on the free-to-them slot for a paid argument in favor of Prop 421 include Tucson City Council member Selina Barajas, Pima County Supervisor Andrés Cano, Rep. Kevin Volk, Sen. Brian Fernandez and former Tucson Mayor Jonathan Rothschild.

Mayor Regina Romero, Vice Mayor Lane Santa Cruz and Council member Kevin Dahl also submitted arguments in favor of the franchise agreement, as did Pima County Supervisor Jennifer Allen, but they paid the $240 fee themselves.

TEP paying for council members to advocate for TEP is perfectly legal, but we like it when politicians use their own money. (The lowest threshold for politicians to report a gift is $250, so don’t expect to see these $240 gifts from TEP show up in their financial disclosure statements.)

The 136-page publicity pamphlet — printed in English and Spanish — has a long list of well-known Tucsonans who submitted “pro” arguments for the franchise agreement.

But not all of these arguments come straight from the heart.

Both Erica Yngve, the founder and president of Sonoran Stitch Factory, and Tom McKinney, the CEO of Interfaith Community Services, included several of the exact same paragraphs in their pro-TEP arguments.

It’s probably not a coincidence.

Only two groups plunked down the $240 fee to oppose Prop 421 — the Party for Socialism and Liberation and Public Power for Tucson — but we will note last week’s city council meeting was filled with residents opposed to any agreement with TEP, whose parent company is Canada-based Fortis Inc.

We’ve talked to TEP in the past about Prop 421, and the company wanted to make it clear that the funding for the TEP for Tucson PAC comes from TEP’s checkbook, not directly from ratepayer payments.

And while spending $14,000 on arguments in the publicity pamphlet sounds like a lot of money to us workaday reporters, the electric utility is spending a lot more on television ads.

Records filed with the Federal Communications Commission show TEP for Tucson reserved nearly $1.5 million in television ads, with the first series launching last month. Put another way, TEP bought roughly 17,000 ad airings on local television between now and Election Day.

We still have not seen campaign finance reports for the PAC, but given the hard social media push it’s doing using the same made-for-TV ads, we are sure the total is a decent chunk of change.

In a statement to the press, Public Power for Tucson acknowledged it can’t keep up with the massive, international company.

But it argued a multimillion-dollar campaign is a red flag.

Ballots are expected to start hitting Tucson mailboxes next week.

And if you wanna learn more about Prop 421, check out our recent coverage.

Since we’ve dedicated most of today’s edition to voter information pamphlets, we thought we’d touch on Pima Community College’s Prop 430 pamphlet.

The 48-page document is exactly what you expect from a community college bond publicity pamphlet: a letter from the chancellor, a one-page overview of what the $250 million bond will do and a breakdown of how it will hit your tax bill.

The 20 “pro” arguments are a who’s who of Pima College’s heavy hitters. Democratic U.S. Sen. Mark Kelly, Congresswoman Adelita Grijalva, Reps. Alma Hernandez and Consuelo Hernandez, a ton of local mayors, the chamber crowd, TMC and the Pima Foundation all weighed in in favor.

There was one holdout in the pamphlet, from Carlos Mejorado Carrillo, who paid to argue against the bond. His argument is too long to include here, but Carrillo essentially believes the $250 million should be spent on teaching students, specifically mentioning the growth in online instruction.

So with the lovefest for Prop 430, why is Carrillo the lone voice of opposition?

We should probably mention that Carrillo versus PCC was item 11 on last week’s executive session agenda for the PCC Governing Board.

We found at least two lawsuits filed by Carrillo against the college, alleging Title IX retaliation, First Amendment retaliation, civil rights violations and contract interference.

Nothing to see here: After a few testy interactions between border wall contractors and protesters, the U.S. Forest Service is blocking public access to the road that runs along the Arizona-Mexico border, the Tucson Sentinel’s Paul Ingram reports. But the Forest Service isn’t blocking access to Lochiel, where protesters have sat in cottonwoods for several weeks in an attempt to save the trees. Late last month, a Border Patrol agent gave an inkling of what was to come as he tried to get protesters to leave.

Break in the case?: The Pima County Sheriff’s Department says the supposed ransom note that was much discussed on social media was not actually from kidnappers of Nancy Guthrie. Still, Sheriff Chris Nanos urged anyone who receives anything that resembles a ransom note related to the Guthrie disappearance to contact the sheriff’s department.

What’s in a name: TUSD Governing Board member Sadie Shaw said she was “shocked” that the Tucson City Council decided to back off of renaming any city facilities in light of the council’s attempt to rename Joaquin Murrieta Park after local Chicano rights activist Sal Baldenegro. As we noted a few weeks ago, the effort stalled after activists dug up an old domestic violence allegation against Baldenegro. In an oped in the Star, Shaw noted that she’s been part of several renaming efforts, and the process worked fine.

Congrats, Tony: Renowned water expert and Star reporter Tony Davis received the Rachel Carson Award in Excellence in Environmental Writing & Journalism last week. Our former colleague at the Star already has a shelf full of awards, but this one is a pretty big recognition.

The Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission is the state’s only official, nonpartisan voter education resource — created by Arizona voters for voters.

We publish the voter education guide, host the debates, and break down what’s on your ballot. Not who you should vote for — what you need to know before you do.

We may have crossed a line when we spent $25 to put an argument in Pima County’s publicity pamphlet for Proposition 425.

But there we are, sandwiched between Sahuarita Mayor Tom Murphy and Tucson Mayor Regina Romero, making the case for increasing the county’s expenditure limit.

Full transparency: We came this close to submitting a slightly different argument against Proposition 425. But we flipped a coin and “for” won.

Really, we just wanted to see what we can get away with in one of these pamphlet “arguments.” Our argument is largely an ad for why local journalists need to cover politics.